Torymidae (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea) Associated with Bees (Apoidea), with a List of Chalcidoid Bee Parasitoids

—Thirty-one species of Torymidae (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea) are associated with bees. In this review each is keyed and discussed, and geographic ranges and hosts are given. Most species are illustrated. Torymids represent about one-fourth of the 135 species of Chalcidoidea associated with bees. Two summary lists are presented for all chalcidoids, including Torymidae, and the 216 bee species with which they are associated. One is arranged as a bee/parasitoid list and the other as a parasitoid/bee list. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Considering that 22,000 species of Chalcidoidea (Noyes 2003) and 16,000–17,000 bee species (Michener 2000) have been described, the number of chalcidoids reported associated with bees is surprisingly small. At most 135 different chalcidoids have been reared from, or associated with, 216 bee species (see Appendix, derived from Noyes 2003). Of these, the families Torymidae and Leucospidae have the highest percentage of the bee parasitoids (each 22–23%), followed closely by Pteromalidae (18%). The other families associated with bees are: Encyrtidae (13%), Eulophidae (13%), Chalcididae (5%), Eurytomidae (5%), Eupelmidae (3%), Mymaridae (0.6%), and Perilampidae (0.6%) (Appendix: based on Noyes 2003). Although Torymidae and Leucospidae have the highest number of bee parasitoids among Chalcidoidea, this figure is somewhat misleading. Of approximately 1,000 torymid species, only 31 are known (or suspected) to attack bees (Grissell 1995, 2000, 2005; Noyes 2003), so a predilection for bee hosts is not especially pronounced in the family. The host range of this family is extremely broad, but nearly 80% of the known hosts are shared equally between the Hymenoptera and Diptera, most of which are gall-forming cynipids and cecidomyiids (Grissell 1995). Conversely, the entire family Leucospidae, consisting of 135 species, has been presumed to parasitize aculeate Hymenoptera—solitary bees, and less frequently, solitary wasps. In reality, however, hosts are known only for about 30 leucospid species (Boucek 1974, Noyes 2003), so the true relationship of the family to bees is largely unknown. Recently a species of leucospid was reported as an ectoparasitoid of an ichneumonid attacking a cerambycid in limbs of apricot in Iran (Hesami et al. 2005). This finding casts doubt on our concept of host specificity in Leucospidae. In this paper I present a summary of torymid species reported to attack bees, including a review of published information for each species and a key. I also include a world bee/chalcidoid and chalcidoid/bee list for all Chalcidoidea reportedly associated with bees (Appendix). J. HYM. RES. Vol. 16(2), 2007, pp. 234–265